Did the 49ers overpay Kaepernick?

On Wednesday the San Francisco 49ers decided to place star quarterback Colin Kaepernick in the elite club by paying him an elite contract extension of six years worth up to $126 million with $61 million guaranteed, which now makes him one of the highest paid players in the NFL and netting him the most guaranteed money in NFL history.

However, I thought it was only the top elite players and Super Bowl champions who received those kind of pay days. Kaepernick deserves a large contract, but he surely doesn’t deserve to be one of the highest paid players in NFL history. He hasn’t led this team to a Super Bowl Championship.

He led them to a Super Bowl appearance, but not a championship. And in that season had Alex Smith not suffered a mild injury that forced Kaepernick into the starting lineup, we probably wouldn’t even know who Colin really was and is as a player.

Although, when his number was called he stepped up and contributed and the team continued to win games en route to leading them to Super Bowl 47.

However, last season after Smith was traded away and Kaepernick was officially the full time starter, his stats weren’t so spectacular. They weren’t bad, but they weren’t the best of the best. In 2013, he had 21 touchdowns, 8 interceptions, 3,197 passing yards and a quarterback rating of 91.6. Not bad, but not among the best and the best stats are usually what earn players their high paying deals.

When the New Orleans Saints paid their star quarterback Drew Brees a five-year contract worth up to $100 million with $60 million guaranteed, he was coming off of a historic record-breaking season and two seasons prior to that he had led the team to a Super Bowl victory. So, his deal was well deserved.

The other reason I feel like Kaepernick was grossly overpaid has to do with his incident in Miami this offseason. He didn’t suffer any jail time for it, but it still made some negative headlines and for that reason I thought the 49ers would have him play this season out and mature even more before he was awarded this huge contract.

Kaepernick stated after signing his historic deal on Wednesday that he is, “Trying to win as many Super Bowls as I can and I’m going to make sure I’m worth every penny of this (contract).”

I’m not saying he can’t pull this off because he has a great team with great players and a great coaching staff and personnel, I just believe the Seattle Seahawks have something to say about that statement and will cause him even more playoff grief in the near future.

So, what does Kaepernick’s huge deal mean for the rest of his elite teammates? As we saw in Baltimore after Joe Flacco was awarded his huge pay day many of those Ravens players who contributed to the team’s success that year left Baltimore because they felt there wasn’t enough for them to get paid like they deserved.So, could this also be the future in San Francisco as well? Only time will tell.